this is a great little brew house here in Saskatoon and have won some apparently prestigious awards at Monde and World Beer Cup. Some great beer and we were lucky enough to speak at length with the Brewmaster last week, though more on a topic related to the actual malt product used. Very interesting indeed.

You know, Ken, I had been thinking the same thing. I was concerned that the "what are you listening to" thread may overtake the beer thread in posts, but certainly not in content value.

We have already established your soft spot for Belgian beers, so don't try to peddle that "I don't drink beer" schtick.

Okay, ObBeer.

I recently conducted my annual Oktoberfest tasting, including Spaten, Hacker-Pschorr and Paulaner. I loved getting a nice, fresh case of the Spaten at Costco, and have enjoyed it very much. But, to me, the Paulaner still can't be beat.

My latest beer love is Session Beer, from our fine friends at Full Sail in Hood River, OR. It comes in 11 oz stubby bottles and a decidedly non-micro white box. Very unassuming. I did not, at first, know it was from my favorite employee-owned brewery. What a splendid and refreshing beer! It reaffirmed my faith in the notion of a subtle yet satisfying American beer. This is what BudMilloors could have and should have been - an all-malt, pre-prohibition lager. Dangerously drinkable yet a surprisingly deft expression of the brewer's craft. It also has Rock / Paper / Scissors game on the underside of the caps. Very highly recommended.

I miss bigjohn and bigwill.

I've also had a couple of big (9%+ alcohol), sweet Polish porters lately. Too many consonants in weird places for me to remember the names. Fun and interesting beers from an unexpected source.

Well guys nice to see the Beer Thread back to page 1. I haven't really tried many new brew as of lately, but I do have some good news (for me at least). The local place that I shop gets many of it's hard to find brews from a distibutor in New Orleans so I was worried it would hurt their selection. I stopped in the other day to see how they're doing and I quickly saw that the place has now doubled in size and built a wine tasting bar. Things must be going well. I talked to John, their beer guy, and he said that their beer stock is going to double and that a bunch of new selections are on order. I asked him about the distributors and he said that they were only down for a week and now they've had four others send them their beer lists and will gladly send them whatever they request. At this point I was quite happy to hear the great news. I also got to look over one of the lists and here's a few they have on order.

Ayinger Ur-Weisse
Ayinger Celebrator Doppelbock (WOOHOO!!!)
Rogue HazelNut Brown Nectar (I've been wanting to try this one for some time now)
Rogue Jazz Guy Ale
Rogue Shakespeare Stout
Orval
Unibroue (several and I'm so glad to see this one)

He said he's also expecting more of the Fuller's brews, a few more Germans, and also some more micro's. He also said that all of the crazy, special Winter brews will be available again. November needs to hurry up then. Now if they can find anything from Weihenstephaner and Westvleteren I will be very happy.

I did try Fuller's ESB last night and really enjoyed it. The only other ESB I've had is Red Hook ESB, and Fuller's is much better. Really nice balance of hops and malts. I was also surprised by it's nice aroma.